Effects of avian malaria on male behaviour and female visitation in lekking blue‐crowned manakins

Abstract

Avian malaria, the infection by blood parasites of the genus Plasmodium, can reduce host fitness not only through mortality, but also by impairing the expression of sexual selection traits. Although different studies highlight the association of parasitism with a decrease in host reproductive success, few studies have addressed the role of parasites in honest signalling by lekking species. Hence, it is still uncertain which fitness components are affected by parasites in these species. We investigated whether avian malaria is associated with a decrease in mating behaviour of male blue-crowned manakins Lepidothrix coronata and whether it affects female visitation in leks of a population in the central Amazon. Through behavioural observations, we estimated the rates of total male activity and social interaction, as well as the frequency of female visits at individual perches. We then examined if individuals were infected with Plasmodium spp. using molecular techniques. Avian malaria was associated with a decrease in male mating behaviour in each lek, and mating behaviour correlated with female visitation. Although rates of social interaction were not correlated with avian malaria among males, we observed that interacting with several individuals within a lek may be advantageous for males, as they also vocalized and displayed more, thus increasing their chances of being visited by females. Although female visitation was not associated with avian malaria in individuals or leks, it is still possible that female visitation is indirectly affected by avian malaria through the latter's effects on male activity. We suggest a role for male activity as an honest sexual signal for females. Thus, male display rate could be used by females as cue for the probability of a male being infected.

Host species, and not environment, predicts variation in blood parasite prevalence, distribution, and diversity along a humidity gradient in northern South America

“…Although we still lack a comprehensive understanding of the diversity, host breadth, and geographic distribution of avian haemosporidian lineages in northern South America, our results suggest that the Magdalena River Valley likely harbors several generalist parasites because at least two Plasmodium lineages (PADOM 11 and Plasmodium nucleophilum ‐DENPET03) and one Haemoproteus ( H. coatneyi ) infecting Eucometis penicillata have been found in multiple hosts and areas in the Americas, including the Antilles and North America (Durrant et al., ; González, Lotta, García, Moncada, & Matta, ; Harrigan et al., ; Kimura, Darbro, & Harrington, ; Lacorte et al., ; Levin et al., ; Marzal et al., ; Moens & Pérez‐Tris, ; Oakgrove et al., ; Ricklefs et al., ; Roos, Belo, Silveira, & Braga, ; Smith & Ramey, ). In addition, the one Plasmodium lineage infecting Manacus manacus has been previously found in another species of piprid (Blue‐crowned Manakin, Lepidothrix coronata ) in Ecuador, Brazil, and Costa Rica (Bosholn, Fecchio, Silveira, Braga, & Anciães, ; Moens & Pérez‐Tris, ). All three haplotypes that did not match MalAvi sequences (Table ) were closely related to lineages found in Neotropical birds of the same or closely related avian families (Beadell et al., ; Durrant et al., ; Lacorte et al., ).…”

Links between blood parasites, blood chemistry, and the survival of nestling American crows

“…The avian hemosporidian parasites in the genera Leucocytozoon, Plasmodium, and Hemoproteus have been used as a model system in the study of such host-parasite interactions (Atkinson & Van Riper, 1991;Hamilton & Zuk, 1982;Poulin, Marshall, & Spencer, 2000;Zuk & Borrello, 2013), yet their documented costs-and, potentially, the magnitude of selection pressure that they exert-appear to vary widely among hosts, populations, and contexts. They can have devastating impacts in naïve populations (Atkinson & Samuel, 2010), and many studies have reported negative associations with infection in endemic areas, including reductions in condition (Marzal, Bensch, Reviriego, Balbontin, & de Lope, 2008;Merino, Moreno, Sanz, & Arriero, 2000), antipredator behavior (Garcia-Longoria, Moller, Balbontin, de Lope, & Marzal, 2015;Mukhin et al, 2016), mating display behavior (Bosholn, Fecchio, Silveira, Braga, & Anciaes, 2016), survival (Asghar et al, 2015;Krams et al, 2013;Sol, Jovani, & Torres, 2003), and reproductive output (Asghar, Hasselquist, & Bensch, 2011;Knowles, Palinauskas, & Sheldon, 2010;Marzal et al, 2013;Merino et al, 2000). Other studies, however, have reported no associations-or even positive associations-with infection (Cornelius, Davis, & Altizer, 2014;Fargallo & Merino, 2004;Piersma & van der Velde, 2012;Podmokla et al, 2014;Zylberberg et al, 2015), or have reported effects that vary among host species (Atkinson & Van Riper, 1991;Ellis, Kunkel, & Ricklefs, 2014;Sorci, 2013), host population (Piersma & van der Velde, 2012), parasite species (Asghar et al, 2011;Lachish, Knowles, Alves, Wood, & Sheldon, 2011;Marzal et al, 2008), and characteristics of individual hosts…”

Focal Animal Sampling

“…This method allows a more detailed behavioral sampling if compared to other sampling methods. Despite its usual application to one individual at a time, adaptations of the method to sample groups of few individuals spatially restricted have been reported (Anciães and Prum 2008;Bosholn et al 2016).…”